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Back in May when I made the Chicken Enchiladas in Green Sauce I had wanted to make the green sauce (or salsa verde) from scratch but I was unable to find any tomatillos . I was a bit depressed because I could not recall having ever seen any tomatillos in any grocery store ever. I resigned myself to using canned salsa verde. When I was at the farmers market on the weekend I saw some tomatillos and quickly picked them up!

Salsa verde is pretty simple to make. You pretty much just cook the tomatillos and blend everything into a salsa. It was great! It was super fresh, it had a great flavour and some heat. I wanted to enjoy the salsa verde for itself so I used it as a dip for tortilla chips. I made a enough that I have some left over that I look forward to using in another dish.

The article on wikipedia says that tomatillos can be frozen. I think I will try to get some more and freeze them so that I can make my own salsa verde again when I cannot find fresh tomatillos.

Update (10/22/2008):
I have made salsa verde a bunch of times over the last year and I have tried playing around with it in different ways. One of the first new things that I tried was roasting the tomatillos as suggested in the comments below and it turned out great! Roasting vegetables always adds a lot of flavour. I also tried adding some chipotle chilies to add some smokey heat to the salsa verde and it also turned out really well.

Salsa Verde

ingredients

1 pound tomatillos (husks removed)

2 jalapeno peppers (sliced in half and seeded)

1 small onion (sliced into 8 wedges)

2 cloves garlic

1 lime (juice and zest)

1/2 cup cilantro

salt and pepper to taste

directions

Place the tomatillos, jalapenoes and onion in a single layer on a baking sheet with the skin of the peppers up.

Broil in the oven until the tomatillos are blackened all over and the jalapenos skin is blackened. Note: You may have to remove the peppers from the oven before the tomatillos. (Feel free to remove the charred outer skins first.)

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comments:

wow, the tomatillos look very interesting! I've never seen it before in the markets, or maybe they were there but I never took note because I didn't know what they were. I'll have to look out for them now.

I love salsa verde! I had no idea that tomatillos could be frozen. They are available at my grocery store every so often (I haven't figured out a rhyme or reason why they appear and disappear), so now that I know they can be frozen, I will buy them whenever I see them and freeze some.

I'm surprised so many people haven't seen tomatillos. I guess I'm living in the land of Mexican food here. They're an essential ingredient in Child Verde, one of my all time favorite Mexican dishes. Love the sound of this recipe. I haven't made my own salsa verde, but it sounds like I should try making it.

Ohh, I never bothered doing this because all the recipes I saw required that you skinned the tomatillos - and lets be honest that is so much work! Maybe it is worth trying since I have seen them in the grocery store lately.

I've grown tomatillos, back when I had a garden. If you can grow them here, I would say you can certainly grow them in France.

They are cultivated pretty much like tomatoes, but they are easier and more weed-like. In fact, if you don't remove all the fallen tomatillos carefully, you will have a lot of volunteers the next year.

I love tomatillos. Living in TX has really spoled me on tex mex and authentic Mexican cooking. If you can try roasting all the ingredients on a charcoal grill and then peeling the skins and blending them in the food processor. It gives it a much more full bodied taste than boiling and or blending un cooked ingredients.

In Toronto, I found the tomatillos at the farmers market as the St Lawrence Market when they were in season. There is also a small fresh produce shop in the basement of the St Lawrence Market where I have seen them when they were not in season.

You may have figured this out already, this post being a year old and all, but tomatillos (and green tomatoes) are easily found in Kensington Market in the Central American/Mexican grocery stores on the east side of Augusta, just north of the FreshMart. Probably a lot cheaper than in St Lawrence too!

I make this quite a bit, as tomatillos are in every mexican grocery store here in Denver, usually around a dollar a pound. Here's my suggestions: Instead of simmering, put the tomatillos under the broiler just till they're lightly browned all over (keep turning them) Don't worry about peeling them, and use any juice they release. Roasting the jalapenos over an open flame such as a gas stove until they're black and then peeling them will add good flavor (stick a fork in the stem end). Also, adding a pinch of sugar will counteract any tartness of the tomatillos.

Hi Kevin,Your cooking is definitely NOT boring. These dips look fantastic. I visited your blog last evening and this morning my friend asked if I'd make a healthy vegan dip for the super bowl. I instantly thought of your recipe, and with a few easy adaptions to your adapted recipe, I was able to achieve that. Of course, I linked to your Closet Cooking blog. Thanks for the inspiration!

For those of you that can not find fresh tomatillos in your grocery store look for canned ones. We found a brand called Embasa at our Tom Thumb/Safeway in the Mexican Food aisle when the fresh ones were either not available or not too pretty. And if you can't find them at your grocery store Amazon.com has them here: http://www.amazon.com/Embasa-Whole-Tomatillos-12-oz/dp/B0000GG242 and MexGrocer.com has them here: http://www.mexgrocer.com/1175.html

I make huge batches of salsa verde at a time and freeze it in the small wide mouth canning jars. That way it is used up before it gets a chance to go bad. There may be a little liquid at the top after thawing, just mix it in real well. Caution: don't try to home can this recipe, find a recipe designed for canning.

I just made your recipe for Salsa Verde (for the second time). It is so very good! I used jalapeno's from the jar (Christopher's) because it's all I had on hand. It turned out great!! Thanks for the delicious and simple recipe.

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I came to realize that my meals were boring and that I had been eating the same few dishes over and over again for years. It was time for a change! I now spend my free time searching for, creating and trying tasty new recipes in my closet sized kitchen.